Canada does not know the whereabouts of some industrial waste imported from the United States and Mexico, and significant gaps remain in the reporting and tracking of transfers for the disposal of industrial waste on a continental scale.
This is according to a report by the Commission for Environmental Cooperation (CEC) of North America, which analyzed data reported by some 24,000 industrial establishments in Canada, the United States and Mexico to their releases and transfers of pollutants (PRTP) respective national.
Some industrial pollutants are transferred beyond the borders of the countries from which they originate for recycling or disposal.
For example, Canadian municipalities, gas sites and other industries have sent several hundred kilograms of total phosphorus in recent years to the United States for disposal.
How was this phosphorus eliminated? Difficult to know, because if in Canada, it is mandatory to declare total phosphorus waste, this is not the case in the United States.
Conversely, US companies are required to report barium waste, but Canadian companies are not.
However, Canadian sites receive barium waste from American steel mills, but it is not known where this waste ends up.
“As soon as it crosses the border, we don’t know where this barium is going,” explained Danielle Vallée, project manager for the North American PRTR Initiative.
Health and environmental risks
In its report, the Commission for Environmental Cooperation of North America indicates that the different reporting requirements of PRTRs for industrial wastes and the inability, in some cases, to follow in their footsteps, hampers the ability of researchers, governments and the public to fully understand the risks associated with their disposal.
“If the barium ends up in a landfill, or in a retention basin, and there is no adequate control, it can contaminate groundwater, therefore sources of drinking water”, a indicated Danielle Vallée to The Canadian Press.
“What happens in a context of climate change? What happens if a flood occurs and we don’t know what kinds of pollutants a landfill contains? This makes it difficult to effectively and quickly manage the risks to the community and the environment,” added Ms. Vallée.
Incomplete and sometimes erroneous information
The Commission for Environmental Cooperation of North America is an intergovernmental organization created in 1994 to promote environmental protection after the creation of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).
For the commission to fulfill its mandate and protect the public, the UNECE report stresses that countries must update their national pollutant registers.
Each national PRTR program has its own list of pollutants (or groups of pollutants) that are subject to reporting. In Canada, the National Pollutant Release Inventory lists approximately 320 substances, the Mexican RETC 200, and the US Toxic Release Inventory has over 700. Only 70 pollutants (or groups of pollutants) are common to the three countries.
“We are working with the programs of the three countries to show where the gaps are. If we had comparable data for the three countries, we could develop better waste management practices and minimize waste generation,” explained Danielle Vallée.
The report also uncovered other data quality issues, such as misreporting of industry sector codes, “that are likely to have significant implications for the ability to know what industrial activities are in America.” of the North, as well as the pollutants they generate”.
In other cases, the information in company declarations is simply insufficient.
“The information for cross-border transfers tends to be incomplete, sometimes the company completes the declaration, but does not necessarily know the coordinates of the site in the other country where it sends its waste”, underlined Danielle Vallée.
Warning against PFAS
The report warns of the negative impacts of perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), a group of man-made chemicals known as “eternal chemicals”.
Some PFASs are associated with cancer, thyroid and liver problems, and birth defects.
The EEC recalls that recently high levels of PFAS have been found in sewage sludge-based biosolids applied to agricultural land in the United States and elsewhere.
Last March, the Government of Quebec announced the imposition of a temporary moratorium on the agricultural application of biosolids imported from the United States.
The UNECE recommends that PFAS be included in the PRTR pollutant lists.
Five billion kg of declared pollutants
The CEC report indicates that industrial facilities in Canada, the United States and Mexico reported a total of some 5 billion kilograms of pollutants each year, 335 million of which they transferred off-site for disposal.
The report’s authors said the study was developed in response to concerns about certain waste disposal practices, such as landfilling and land spreading, which can release contaminants into the environment and lead to long-term pollution while having adverse effects on the health of the population.